Beyond Perfect; Embrace Your Imperfections

Are you ready to move beyond perfect and embrace your imperfections? The world order of systems, checks, and balances requires a perfectionistic view to run smoothly. Do you agree? As the frequencies of light, knowledge, and wisdom rise, you may find that your old worldview no longer fits for you. The energy frequency of perfectionism runs slowly like ice. Energy that is slow-moving and sluggish is challenged by the rapid ever-changing frequencies. Is your life starting to show cracks in the walls? Are you noticing your cracks of perfectionism crumbling under the pressure to change? My intuitive sense tells me that many of us just might be cracking under the pressure of perfect ideas. Psychology Today suggests that perfectionism is a coping mechanism from childhood.

The world is imperfect, life is imperfect and when we view all of our screw-ups through a perfectionistic lens it can feel downright painful. If I can be honest, these last few years forced me to see all the imperfections in the governmental systems. I find myself asking, how did our politics, banking, and community support systems get so imperfect and broken? You can imagine my surprise when I viewed these imperfect governments from a historical viewpoint I had to admit, it has never been perfect. Our systems are run by everyday human beings who may start with perfectionistic ideas of making positive changes. If those idealistic ideas never seem to manifest perfectly, then leadership can become disillusioned as well and just stop trying. Then corruption, like rust, starts eating away and destroying any perfect ideas around what government can accomplish.

Whoever started the original template of what a perfect person should be like? How about the perfectionistic templates of what a perfect mother, father, daughter, son, child, or family should look like? Have you ever wondered what standards you are attempting to live up to and who first set that standard? When I began to take a serious look at my own imperfections, it felt as if I was so deeply flawed that I had no business attempting to be or do anything. Learning to embrace my imperfections as just a part of being human was not an overnight success. Especially since I had so many perfect rules, in fact, layers of perfect rules to live by that needed sorting. Yet, even attempting to sort through and embrace imperfection had to be done in a perfect way! A deep-dive rabbit hole of perfection has layers upon layers of flaws to sort through.

The thought of letting go of being beyond perfect and embracing imperfection sounds and feels harder than it is. When your mind is behind the wheel, driving your perfectionistic thoughts, your mind can tell you that you will lose your drive to succeed. Losing your perfect measuring tape of high standards will turn you into a lazy unmotivated sloth. Which is another lie your mind attempts to tell you. My mind was ready for battle when I considered allowing a deep embrace of imperfection. Guess what? It was exhilarating when I stepped off that cliff of perfectionism and embraced those imperfect cracks and flaws in my humanness. Like an eagle taking flight I was able to see the beauty of life all around me just as imperfect as it is. I could feel the wind blowing through my aura because I had dissolved those thick glass walls of perfect ideas. No longer stuck behind thick walls of how I should be, I now had the freedom to simply be me.

Can you believe, that you can be much more productive in life when you let go of perfectionism? I took more chances and risks, embracing imperfect failure as a learning gift. I found myself throwing my hat into the ring of chance, as a challenge to grow and blossom in all my imperfections. Laughing at myself served to help me move through those perfectionistic land mines, with light-minded, light-footed dance steps. In 2014, my work life was slowly growing and expanding yet my personal family life was showing its imperfect cracks and seemed to be crumbling quickly. As an exhausted, caregiver, with overcare and over-concern for others, I had placed my personal needs aside, in my attempt to glue my family back into a perfect state. After all, I was a healer, I should be able to do this. My spirit told me I must step out of the chaotic frequency. Make some shifts of my own and with a new imperfect perspective.

James Van Praagh, a world-renowned Psychic Medium was coming to Seattle, to offer a 5-day Mediumship Training. In my eyes, he was the perfect teacher ( I had never met him). He had written many books, and produced one of my favorite weekly shows, ‘Ghost Whisperer’. I knew submerging myself in his course would be just the kick-start I needed. Creating a little retreat time, I rented a room even though I could have driven. My private client sessions and courses were always full, so my mind told me I would be a perfect candidate to cross over into mediumship (the ability to talk to your loved ones) as an additional offer of services. Well, that is not what happened at all! About 4 hours into the first day, he had us doing mediumship readings for other people in the class and suddenly I started to laugh because I found myself failing at being a medium. That entire week, I worked my little spiritual bum off attempting to find some level of ease at being a medium. My hard perfectionist idea of how easy this would be for me, crumbled. My outcome of success was crumbs instead of the entire sandwich. Laughing cracked the thick glass of perfectionism, and a bit of ego too!

I became an imperfect medium over time. I learned that sometimes spirit comes through and sometimes it doesn’t. The more I embraced my imperfection around being a medium, the better medium I became. Five years later, I completed an application to apprentice with James Van Praagh. This included going through a personal interview process with JVP. I was accepted into his 1-year training program even after he told me there was no more room. I took it as a sign from spirit that it was meant to be. This master teacher told me 2 things that stood out; “Nancy, your high standards of integrity are a handicap.” Which told me that I only wanted to share information with clients that I felt was of the highest honesty. This caused me to hold back on much information that wanted to come through from spirit. The second thing he told me was; “Nancy, you are an incredible medium with storyteller qualities that you perform with color. He went further to say, I wish I had met you 10 years ago, You could have been a star.” This told me, I had practiced to become good at what I do but too bad, I am too old now to make a difference! I share this story because YOU can become anything you wish to be even though it might not happen overnight and you are never too old to begin the imperfect life you wish to live.

The energy of perfection appears like thick unbreakable glass in the aura. The greater the level of perfectionism, high standards, and high expectations you place on yourself, the thicker the walls of impenetrable glass. I talk much more about the perfect glass layers in the video. The beauty of meditative energy work shows how simple and easy it can be to shift perspectives. Recognizing you may be looking at a situation through perfect glasses is the first step towards shifting perspectives. Which allows you to be less than perfect and gives grace to others who may not be able to live up to your standards. If you are trapped in a thick glass bubble of perfectionism, you can’t breathe. Your head, chest, and body feel so compressed, tight, and contracted. The instant you allow that thick glass to shatter under the light of your soul, is when you can start breathing again. Read my blog on ‘Cracking the Perfectionistic Code’.

When an individual is born into this world, they come in with a briefcase of required obstacles to overcome. You may find mountains of strength to obtain, harsh lessons to heal, and joys to experience. Your human self is expected to do it all, in sloppy, messy, imperfect ways with as much authentic vulnerability as you can tolerate before collapsing in exhaustion. Measuring all those human steps on the learning scale against the most perfect high standards can slow down your whole process. Spirit shows the metaphor of perfectionism is like attempting to drive a rusty car with a frozen engine. Pushing that rust bucket of metal all the way uphill is exhausting. Moving beyond perfect, and embracing imperfections frees you to run fast laughing along your path, even when you might skin your knees or break a few bones (metaphorically).

Striving for perfection can sometimes feel like navigating through a labyrinth of unrealistic expectations. The first step through the labyrinth is knowing you may place unrealistic expectations on yourself, your workload, and your relationships. Check yourself, and ask that question; Are my expectations too high? Or Are my expectations too low? Perfectionism qualities may give you the impression that you will never be perfect enough. Remember in the movie The Wizard of OZ? The song that expressed, if I only had a brain? You can lead yourself through the labyrinth of perfectionism and give up because you do not believe you will ever be perfect enough for yourself or anyone’s standards around you. Remember my Medium story where I wished I could naturally be good but truthfully I sucked at it? I did not allow my measure of good, to slow me down. It might have taken me 5 years but I rose to embrace the realistic expectations and pace myself at my pace. Now, I will say here that my mother has natural mediumship ability. She never had to work with herself in the same way I had to work with myself to achieve a desired outcome. I say this so you know, easy or not it is important that you listen to your imperfect intuitive senses that tell you to keep going when it’s hard.

When perfectionism is part of your default mode of operating through life it can feel daunting to make that shift. I suggest starting by making a list of the different roles you have in your life. Ask yourself, what perfect concepts do I have about women, men, or gender-neutral qualities? What type of work do you do? For example, if you are a nurse, a teacher, or a water tester, what perfect ideas do you have about your role in your job? I have noticed some of the bigger ones are what concepts do you have around perfect mothers or fathers? Another big perfectionistic trigger is your concept of the perfect wife or perfect husband. So start your list and allow yourself to become conscious of those ideas of being perfect where you may want to make some adjustments. We are all healing these concepts together. Thank you for joining me.